List of Famous people named William

William Silva de Carvalho ComM is a Portuguese professional footballer who plays for Spanish club Real Betis and the Portugal national team as a defensive midfielder.

Sir William Ramsay was a Scottish chemist who discovered the noble gases and received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1904 "in recognition of his services in the discovery of the inert gaseous elements in air" along with his collaborator, John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh, who received the Nobel Prize in Physics that same year for their discovery of argon. After the two men identified argon, Ramsay investigated other atmospheric gases. His work in isolating argon, helium, neon, krypton and xenon led to the development of a new section of the periodic table.

William Moses Kunstler was an American lawyer and civil rights activist, known for defending the Chicago Seven. Kunstler was an active member of the National Lawyers Guild, a board member of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the co-founder of the Law Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), the "leading gathering place for radical lawyers in the country."

William McMaster Murdoch, RNR was a Scottish sailor, who was the First Officer on the RMS Titanic. He was the officer in charge on the bridge when the ship collided with an iceberg, and was one of the more than 1,500 people who died when the ship sank. His body was never recovered. The circumstances of his death are mysterious and therefore the subject of much controversy.

William II was the last King of Württemberg. He ruled from 6 October 1891 until the dissolution of the kingdom on 30 November 1918. He was also the last German ruler to abdicate in the wake of the November Revolution of 1918.

William David Sanders is an American real estate businessman and developer.

William Kamkwamba is a Malawian inventor and author. He gained fame in his country in 2001 when he built a wind turbine to power multiple electrical appliances in his family's house in Wimbe, 32 km (20 mi) east of Kasungu, using blue gum trees, bicycle parts, and materials collected in a local scrapyard. Since then, he has built a solar-powered water pump that supplies the first drinking water in his village and two other wind turbines, the tallest standing at 12 meters (39 ft), and is planning two more, including one in Lilongwe, the political capital of Malawi.

William Steele Sessions was an American attorney and jurist who served as a United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas and Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Sessions served as FBI director from 1987 to 1993, when he was dismissed by President Bill Clinton. He was the father of Texas Congressman Pete Sessions.

William Joseph Burns is an American diplomat and career ambassador serving as the director of the Central Intelligence Agency since March 19, 2021. He previously served as the United States deputy secretary of state from 2011 to 2014. He retired from the US Foreign Service in 2014 after a 33-year diplomatic career. From 2014 to 2021, he served as president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

William Lyon Mackenzie was a Scottish-born Canadian-American journalist and politician. Growing up in Dundee, Scotland, he emigrated to York, Upper Canada, and became a publisher. He was elected to the 10th Parliament of Upper Canada as a legislator from York, allied with Reform legislators, and investigated members of the Family Compact and Tory politicians. His critiques of government administrators caused Mackenzie to be expelled from the legislature numerous times. He brought grievances from Upper Canada citizens to the Colonial Office in London, England, which caused the colonial secretary to propose reforms in the colony.